About 70 percent of businesses in the manufacturing and service sectors have been negatively affected by a local COVID-19 outbreak that started in May, but the impact is “manageable,” the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI, 工研院) said in a report yesterday.
The report, prepared with the help of industrial and trade organizations, surveyed Taiwanese businesses last month and this month during a nationwide level 3 COVID-19 alert, with 52.2 percent of respondents saying that pandemic restrictions in the workplace or working from home affected their productivity.
Manufacturers were most concerned about logistics difficulties caused by the pandemic, with container ships stuck at foreign ports or simply unavailable, it said.
Photo courtesy of Industrial Technology Research Institute
Had the level 3 alert continued until the end of the year, 50.2 percent of the polled manufacturers said they would have faced components and raw material shortages, it said.
The components shortage “is not just due to level 3 controls, but also stems from the reshuffling of global supply chains,” it said.
Companies in the service sector were hit harder by decreased business, with 39.3 percent saying they have seen significantly reduced orders and 38.6 percent reporting modestly reduced orders, while 8.8 percent reported higher orders due to pandemic-related demand.
However, 4.3 percent said they had suspended operations due to the pandemic.
“The biggest concern of businesses is the smooth and swift administration of vaccines,” the report said.
About 80 percent of respondents said vaccination was a “pressing concern,” it said.
The pandemic should hasten efforts to facilitate the digital transformation of Taiwanese businesses to boost the resilience of Taiwanese supply chains, said Stephen Su (蘇孟宗), vice president and general director of Industry, Science and Technology International Strategy Center at ITRI.
“We had expected a 10-year timeline for the digital transformation of Taiwanese businesses, but in the wake of ‘black swan’ events like COVID-19, that needs to be brought forward,” Su said. “We need to strengthen Taiwanese supply chains so we can keep our key position in the greater global supply chain.”
“It is no longer good enough to simply chase the lowest costs. A more well-distributed supply chain and the ability of businesses to continue operating online would help Taiwanese businesses keep operating in case of unexpected events,” he said.
Taiwan’s foreign exchange reserves fell below the US$600 billion mark at the end of last month, with the central bank reporting a total of US$596.89 billion — a decline of US$8.6 billion from February — ending a three-month streak of increases. The central bank attributed the drop to a combination of factors such as outflows by foreign institutional investors, currency fluctuations and its own market interventions. “The large-scale outflows disrupted the balance of supply and demand in the foreign exchange market, prompting the central bank to intervene repeatedly by selling US dollars to stabilize the local currency,” Department of Foreign
Intel Corp is joining Elon Musk’s long-shot effort to develop semiconductors for Tesla Inc, Space Exploration Technologies Corp and xAI, marking a surprising twist in the chipmaker’s comeback bid. Intel would help the Terafab project “refactor” the technology in a chip factory, the company said on Tuesday in a post on X, Musk’s social media platform. That is a stage in the development process that typically helps make chips more powerful or reliable. The chipmaker’s shares jumped 4.2 percent to US$52.91 in New York trading on Tuesday. The Terafab project is a grand plan by Musk to eventually manufacture his own chips for
Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) yesterday said it plans to resume operations at two coal-fired power generators for three months to boost security of electricity supply as liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply risks are running high due to the Middle East conflict. The two coal-fired power generators are at Mailiao Power Plant in Yunlin County’s Mailiao Township (麥寮). The plant, operated by Formosa Plastics Group (台塑集團), supplied electricity to Taipower’s power grid until the end of last year. Taipower’s decision came about one month after Minister of Economic Affairs Kung Ming-hsin (龔明鑫) on March 10 said that the nation had no imminent
Some robotaxi passengers were left stranded in the middle of fast-moving traffic in a major Chinese city after their driverless vehicles stopped running, according to police and media reports on Wednesday. A preliminary investigation indicates more than 100 robotaxis came to a halt because of a “system malfunction,” police in the city of Wuhan said in a statement, without elaborating. No injuries were reported. One passenger told Chinese media that their robotaxi stopped after turning a corner. An instruction on a screen read: “Driving system malfunction. Staff are expected to arrive in 5 minutes.” After no one showed up, the passenger pushed
RSS